Ill, elderly, or infirm persons typically desire to remain at home and continue to live as independently as possible. However, it is not practical for some people to live a completely independent life and various types of assistance or supportive care is needed. Healthcare professionals, or family and friends typically provide assistive or supportive care. In order for others to provide the needed assistance and support they must to be notified when help is needed. Thus, there is a need to monitor and communicate with a person that desires to live as independently as possible, as well as provide monitoring and communication capabilities to those directly or indirectly involved in providing assistance or care to the person.
Monitoring and evaluating physical activity patterns, detecting the occurrence of falls, and recognizing deviations from normal life patterns that indicate the need for assistance are not readily available due to the lack of devices and systems that allow monitoring of a person in an accurate, convenient, unobtrusive, and socially acceptable manner. There is a need for development of assistive technologies that monitor and communicate in an unobtrusive, dignified manner.